Data Sources & Verification Hierarchy
Data Sources & Verification Hierarchy
Best Trading Courses draws on primary sources for strategy breakdowns and course reviews. Verification is tiered.
Tier 1 — Championship Audited (real-money competition)
World Cup Trading Championships (WCTC) — Robbins Trading Company audited brokerage statements. Used for: Darren O'Neill (2023 Trading World Champion / 2025 WCTC multi-division), Patrick Nill, Pau Perdices Bellet, Serghey Magala, Ivan Scherman, Jaime Passy, and others.
US Investing Championship — annual real-money equity competition. Used for: Mark Minervini, Oliver Kell, David Ryan, Steven Dux.
Tier 2 — Fund / Institution Audited
BarclayHedge — hedge-fund-tracking database with monthly NAV and verified returns. Used for: Jarratt Davis (forex fund records), and other institutional fund managers.
HFR (Hedge Fund Research) — hedge-fund index publisher.
SEC filings (Form ADV, Form 13F) — used for: Buffett, Soros, Druckenmiller, Cohen, Griffin, Dalio, Englander, Shaw.
Tier 3 — Platform-Tracked / Broker-Linked
Myfxbook, MQL5 — live broker-account tracking platforms. Less robust than Tier 1 (can be subject to gaming via demo accounts or selective broker-of-record).
Tier 4 — Public Disclosure
Self-published broker statements, on-air live trades, trade-log disclosures. Used as supplementary context where a Tier 1-3 source is also present.
Tier 5 — Self-Reported (excluded from "verified" claims)
Screenshots, testimonials, marketing-page returns, social-media P&L claims. Not accepted as verification.
Course-content sources
Course breakdowns are sourced from: (1) publicly-released course modules and free preview content, (2) public interviews and presentations by course operators, (3) published methodology books and articles by course operators, (4) primary-source descriptions of strategies (where available). We do not redistribute paid course materials.
Editorial integrity vs commercial sites
Many trading-education review sites are funded by affiliate commissions from courses they review. Affiliate-funded reviewers consistently rank courses with the highest commission payouts in their top three. Best Trading Courses rejects affiliate revenue entirely. The cost of editorial independence is forgone affiliate revenue. The benefit is rankings unaffected by commission incentives.